discdoh wrote:The Turkey Toss and Holly Daze were on the 2010 calendar as qualifiers. This means that it was determined more than 12 months ago that this would be the case. It always works this way. If you aren't convinced, just go look at the calendar...you will see. Also, just a heads up, The Turkey Toss and Holly Daze are qualifiers in 2011, and 2012, and 2013, and...

I took a look at the calendar for the past year and neither the Turkey Toss or Holly Daze were listed as qualifiers. All of the Ice Bowls were listed as qualifiers though and ended up not counting for anything. I also noticed that the Chainsaw Massacre is not even listed on the official schedule and it ended up being an auto-bid with a turnout of 13 participants!

The final decision is left completely up the captain, so there is not telling what will be qualifiers. I don’t believe anyone had a clue at all how anyone made the Ryder Cup team this past year except for the few events that were auto bids. It seems that everyone else was just a captains picks.

discdoh wrote:The Turkey Toss and Holly Daze were on the 2010 calendar as qualifiers. This means that it was determined more than 12 months ago that this would be the case. It always works this way. If you aren't convinced, just go look at the calendar...you will see. Also, just a heads up, The Turkey Toss and Holly Daze are qualifiers in 2011, and 2012, and 2013, and...

I took a look at the calendar for the past year and neither the Turkey Toss or Holly Daze were listed as qualifiers. All of the Ice Bowls were listed as qualifiers though and ended up not counting for anything. I also noticed that the Chainsaw Massacre is not even listed on the official schedule and it ended up being an auto-bid with a turnout of 13 participants!

The final decision is left completely up the captain, so there is not telling what will be qualifiers. I don’t believe anyone had a clue at all how anyone made the Ryder Cup team this past year except for the few events that were auto bids. It seems that everyone else was just a captains picks.

I think that is how it should be...12 captains picks! Maybe 4 auto-bids and then 8 captain picks but all these points tournaments are just a headache

The schedules that are posted at the courses do not have the correct info. There are many events listed as being Ryder Cup qualifiers last year and as far as I know there were no events used as qualifiers. Only a few auto-bids.

Personally I could care less about the Ryder Cup. It’s pretty much the same group of guys from STL playing the same group of guys from Columbia every year. The captain chooses who the next captain will be, so it’s pretty much has and always will stay within the same group of friends who in turn pick the same guys every year to be on the team. I’m fine with that, but please don’t try and pretend that this event is more then what it really is.

The only reason I even commented on this in the first place is I thought that Morgan had a point in an event being announced as a Ryder Cup qualifier after the fact. With all of the confusion that took place last year you can’t go back and say that it was posted on the schedule. The Turkey Toss and Holly Daze were not used as qualifiers last year, so I don’t think it was a given that they would be again this year. There are also tournaments on the schedule that never happened and tournament locations that changed at the last minute.

One of the problems with the Ryder Cup is that we try to make it something that it is not. It is and has always been and exclusionary “clique” event. The first time I asked Don Moellenbeck what Ryder Cup was about he laughed and told me I really shouldn’t be worried about it. He wasn’t being a jerk, it was the truth. The Ryder Cup was an event I was never going to be invited to participate in held on a private course I was never going to be invited to play on. So, why should I worry about it?

Match play events are fun and there are some cool events like Texas Teams and Virginia Team Invitationals that take advantage of the format. Ryder Cup isn’t one of these. Texas Teams and VTI both have formats where a team has X # of Open, X # of Advanced, X # of Masters, X # of Women, etc. The teams include a wide variety of skill levels, so if you are an Intermediate chucker you can still be on a team and participate if you would like. Ryder Cup is just for Open guys, so 95% of the players in the Club have zero, zilch, nada, no chance of ever being on a Ryder Cup team. We try to pass of Ryder Cup qualifiers like it means something, but in reality to the vast majority of golfers it is going to mean nothing. We can argue about the qualifiers, but in the end the actual realistic pool of players that might possibly make a Ryder Cup team is very small. A lot of time goes into tracking points for a team that you can pretty much name right now.

Given the attention that Ryder Cup gets, it seems like a no-brainer that something would have been done to include an Amateur team match by now. There has not. To me the reason for that is the same reason Don was laughing at me 15 years ago. It’s not for AM’s. Never was, never will be. It’s an event created by Open players organized by Open players for Open players. That’s not knocking it. If I was one of those guys, it would be something I looked forward to. I’m just not one of those guys, and most of us aren’t.

It would be nice if Missouri could put together an event like Texas Teams. An event like that probably would get a lot of play, and if a St. Louis team won there would be your braggin’ rights. That would be the kind of event that everybody could get excited about. Then Ryder Cup could be important to the couple dozen people it is meant to be important to.

Anyway, complaining about the Ryder Cup being a clique event is like complaining about a tire being round. That’s the point, really.

Disc Up Stiff,The Traveling LAKERS have started and continue to participate in a match golf event that pits us against other pick teams from around the midwest. It is our annual Outlaw Event.

The teams include a wide variety of skill levels, so if you are an Intermediate chucker you can still be on a team and participate if you would like.

Now, we don't try to make it something it is not, when we pick the people for the team (8 men & 1 woman with appropriate seeds) the first and foremost requirement is that you are a LAKER. That means that you have come out and played with us and that you can represent disc golf in a way that will make the greater Saint Louis area disc golfers be seen as the fun/fair group of disc golfer's that we are. Also you must have the LAKER attitude. At this event we put as much emphasis on the Saturday night party as we do in having a great round and meeting new friends. The team match play is just the reason for us to get together. Being as we have to pick seeds for this event, we usually have a LAKER round or two of the team to see what seed you are. But with this being a friendly event, of course we pick the team by a general consensus of 4 core LAKERS and then make sure that it goes over well enough for the team. We can and have changed the seeding to make for a happier team. Generally we offer the original team first shot, if they cannot make it we will offer the members that have been on the team on other years. If more LAKERS are still needed, then we offer out invitations. This event focuses on fun, just ask the legend or bags, and the cost is minimium. Camping for the weekend usually free but we drop $10 a person, $25 entry fee (100% payout to the first place team), gas & food. Come on out and do some LAKER league play, that is the first step in getting in on this fun experience. Or you can do just what I did and start a event with other teams, but let me tell you, it is much easier to play with us than go through all of the effort to start up a team match golf event. Love to have you along.